BY JAMESON CHAULUKA:
The Pharmaceutical Society of Malawi has faulted President Peter Mutharika’s appointment of board of directors for the Poisons and Medicines Board.
Pharmaceutical Society of Malawi Secretary General, Josiah Mayani, said there are a number of anomalies in Mutharika’s appointment of the board.
Mayani said, to begin with, according to the Malawi Pharmacy Medicines and Poisons Act of 1988, powers to appoint directors of the board rest with the Minister of Health and Population Services and not the President.
“The powers to appoint the directors of the board lies with the Minister of Health who, as we speak, is Honourable Atupele Muluzi— or has the President also become Minister of Health to appoint the board?” he queried.
Josiah also faulted the appointment of a veterinary surgeon Gray Noniwa as chairperson of the board, saying it violates Section 8 of the Malawi Pharmacy Medicines and Poisons Act— which demands that the chairperson of the board should always be a pharmacist.
“Sensing the dissatisfaction from [members of] the society, government has withdrawn the chairmanship from Noniwa saying he is just one of the members. They have asked the board members to choose a chairperson among themselves but, again, that is wrong because that is not what the Act says. The Act clearly says the Minister of Health should appoint the board of directors including its chairperson,” he said.
The pharmacists also feel underrepresented in the medicine-dominated board although the Malawi Pharmacy Medicines and Poisons Act of 1988 provides for a 50 percent representation of pharmacists in the board.
Out of 11 people Mutharika has appointed into the board, only four are pharmacists.
Meanwhile, the society has engaged its lawyers, who have written the Office of the President and Cabinet and Minister of Health demanding that the anomalies should be rectified.
But Minister of Information and Communications Technology and government spokesperson, Nicholas Dausi, Thursday said there is nothing that a minister can do which a President cannot.
Dausi asked the society to engage the Ministry of Health if they are dissatisfied with the composition of the board.
We could not get hold of Noniwa as we went to press.
On a number of times, Mutharika has been blamed for putting wrong people in boards of parastatals and government departments.
Last year, for example, health experts faulted Mutharika for appointing Paramount Chief Lundu as Board Chairperson of Malawi Blood Transfusion.
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